Next to Rosas, the personage who plays the most important part in all the Confederation, is his daughter, Manuelita. The position which this woman has acquired for herself is unique, like that of her father, although relatively less important, since she is not consulted upon State affairs. She possesses, nevertheless, with regard to all that appertains to the second rank, a liberty of action entirely her own. Manuelita is, as it were, an under Secretary of State in the cabinet of a minister in charge of a vast administration. She has her secretaries, her offices, her correspondence; and is well able to attend to a vast amount of important business without neglecting those duties toward society, which her intellectual acquirements and natural amiability of disposition impose upon her. By many writers, Manuelita has been portrayed as a species of bacchante, unceasingly exciting her father to the commission of acts of violence, giving herself up to all the irregularities of a life of dissipation, and scandalizing society by the spectacle of incessant orgies. Now nothing can be less true, nothing more false, than this. It is not necessary to know Manuelita, it is sufficient to have seen her but for a few moments to be convinced of the utter falsehood of these mendacious travelers' tales. Manuelita is Rosas' daughter, and consequently has many prejudices to overcome, many hatreds to conquer: yet she is esteemed and loved by all, which, be it remarked, is no mean praise in a country where it may be said that no one is esteemed. This is, in our idea, the best reply to offer to the various calumnies it has pleased the "many-headed" to heap upon her. And how, we may ask, can it be otherwise? If there is a being on the earth who can soften the rigors of Rosas' tyrannical government, can solicit and obtain mercy or justice, it is Manuelita. She is the sole hope of the unfortunate, of the oppressed, of the poor, and rarely is this hope deceived. Manuelita is tall and elegantly formed. Her age has been stated to be about four-and-thirty although she looks no more than twenty-seven or twenty-eight. Her features are regular and bear the Spanish impress, that is to say, that they are strongly marked. Her large black eyes announce great strength of mind, yet the glances which shoot therefrom have an expression of infinite gentleness and kindness. Her jet black hair serves to bring out in more prominent relief the ivory fairness of her skin. Her entire person, in short, breathes an air of grace and refinement to be met with only in the Spanish women, who possess the rare art of being able to join to the charms of beauty a certain _abandon_ unknown to the women of other countries.